The Summit Redwood

Only stand high a long enough time your lightning     will come; that is what blunts the peaks of     redwoods;

But this old tower of life on the hilltop has taken     it more than twice a century, this knows in

Cell the salty and the burning taste, the shudder     and the voice.                      The fire from heaven; it has     felt the earth's

Roaring up hill in autumn, thorned oak-leaves tossing     their bright ruin to the bitter laurel-leaves,     and

Its under-forest has died and died, and lives to be     burnt; the redwood has lived.

Though the fire     entered,

It cored the trunk while the sapwood increased.

The     trunk is a tower, the bole of the trunk is a     black cavern,

The mast of the trunk with its green boughs the     mountain stars are strained

Is like the helmet-spike on the highest head of an     army; black on lit blue or hidden in

It is like the hill's finger in heaven.

And when the     cloud hides it, though in barren summer, the

Make their own rain.                     Old Escobar had a cunning trick     when he stole beef.

He and his

Would drive the cow up here to a starlight death and     hoist the carcass into the tree's hollow,

Then let them search his cabin he could smile for     pleasure, to think of his meat hanging

Exalted over the earth and the ocean, a theft like a     star, secret against the supreme sky.